This paper purports to analyze the verificationist theory of meaning proposed by logical positivism. According to this theory, only sentences verifiably by means of empirical observation have meanings. Our purpose is to show the reasons why the verificationist theory collapses. In order to do so, we will examine both the internal and external critiques to it. Among the internal critiques, we will show the logical positivists’ failed attempts to formulate an adequate weak verification criterion. Among the external critiques, we will focus on the ones formulated by J.L. Austin on the basis of his theory of performative utterances. / El presente trabajo busca analizar la teoría verificacionista del significado propuesta por el positivismo lógico. De acuerdo a esta teoría, solo los enunciados verificables por medio de la observación empírica tienen significado. Nuestro propósito es mostrar las razones por las cuales la teoría verificacionista del significado colapsa. Para ello, examinaremos tanto las críticas internas como externas. En las críticas internas mostraremos los intentos fallidos de los positivistas lógicos en formular un criterio de verificación débil adecuado.  En las críticas externas nos centraremos en las formuladas por J.L. Austin a partir de su teoría de los enunciados realizativos.

The female characters in Shakespeare’s 2 Henry VI and Richard III; Rowley’s All’s Lost by Lust; Fletcher’s The Tragedy of Valentinian; Rowley, Dekker, and Ford’s The Witch of Edmonton; and Brome and Heywood’s The Late Witches of Lancashire curse their enemies because, as women, they have no other way to fight against the injustices they experience. At once an extension of the early modern belief that words are “women’s weapons,” and dangerously beyond the feminine ideal of silence, the curse, as a performative speech act, resembles the physical weapons wielded by men in its potential to cause serious harm. Using Judith Butler’s theory of gender as performative and J. L. Austin’s theory of performative utterances, this thesis argues that curses function as part of the cursing woman’s performative identity, and by using speech as a weapon, the cursing woman gains a measure of social agency within the social order even if she cannot change her place within it.